1,559Thank you for all the wonderful reviews! For those that have Private messages turned off that left Reviews thank you for the reviews! I love reading every one of them so keep them coming.
I want to Thank Margaret Fowler for encouraging this story out of me. When I mentioned it to you 6 – 7 months ago you didn't let it die in my head. You kept pressing for it so here it is finally being written! I hope it is everything you thought it would be.
Standard Disclaimer: The characters aren't mine. They belong to JE I just take them out of the box and play with them a little. I have begged to keep Ranger and Lester for myself but I have yet to get a response…
Hopefully everyone has been enjoying the 30th Olympics and cheering on your fellow countrymen to victory! Team USA is doing great…Michael is now the most decorated Olympiad of all time with 22 medals! I want to also take a moment to single two other Olympian Oscar "Blade Runner" Pistorius running in the Olympics as the first ever amputee being a double amputee. He did an amazing job. He should be an inspiration to everyone of us both athlete and non athlete. He is definitely an example of what the human body can do even against all odds. The other Olympian I want to single out was a competitor of Oscar's in the men's 400. Kirani James, from what they have shown, he has said, and done he seems like such a nice person, one that everyone can learn something from! He is 19 years old. Yet his sportsmanship, and his humanity seem to be years older. He switched nametags with Oscar when he didn't qualify for the finals. He brings home the first medal not to mention it was gold for Grenada. When asked for an autograph for a fan's daughter he writes …..Your mom is so proud of you and signs it. How cool is that? He seems like such a genuinely nice guy.
Now on with the chapter! I Hope you enjoy it…This story is coming to an end. Friday's posting will be the final chapter!
Chapter 46: Coming Home….
RPOV
By the time I got back to Rangeman it was later than I wanted it to be. Tank, Lester and Bobby were still in their offices but my Babe had gone back up to our apartment. Where I wanted to be but I wanted to find out what had happened while I was gone.
"Man you should have seen her she was brilliant." Lester said. I looked at him.
"I showed her the client's file before we left. Well she happened to know one of the employees. He is from the burg. Let me tell you that the burg is one fucked up place and her mother, well she is queen of the fucked up if you ask me. Anyway he is from the burg and she knew him but what she knew about him turned out to be that he and his girlfriend had been robbing the company blind. The company still isn't certain exactly what they have been up to. They fired him, opened an investigation into his activity, and signed the contract with all of our recommendations for both the physical system as well as the cyber system without any negotiating of the price or services." Lester went on t tell me you could hear the excitement and how proud he was of her in his voice.
Hearing everything he told me I couldn't help but feel proud of her as well. Our clients were responding well to her, not that I believed any different.
Tank spoke up. "She came in here asking me what to do if something on the report was wrong. I had no idea what to first make of it, it was only after she pointed out what she knew that I knew how huge it would be for our client. She wasn't certain at first if she should say anything." He said and I looked at him.
"I hope you told her that anything like that she should bring to our attention. She should never be afraid to speak up or say anything regardless of what it is." I said and they all nodded hearing the commanding level of my voice. If there was an issue, I never wanted her second guessing herself. I wanted her to know that she could speak up and tell us anything, any of us.
"She joined us in the gym this morning. She said she didn't sleep well." Lester said. I looked at him.
"She didn't say why she didn't sleep well, just that she didn't. But, I think she had a good time in the gym." Lester said smiling.
"Well I am certain it wasn't your singing and dancing in front of her." Tank said and I looked at Lester raising my eyebrows. He just shrugged his shoulders, not making any further comments.
"Oh you aren't so sexy and know it now, are you, Santos?" Tank said and I quirked my eyebrow at him. He shrugged clearly his face showing he was busted, big time.
"Mats zero five hundred tomorrow." I said and he nodded looking none too pleased with himself. Maybe next time he would think twice before he wiggled his dick in front of my Babe.
"I believe you have a package for me?" I asked Tank trying to get this conversation back where I wanted it to be. I wanted to collect the package and go see my Babe. Tank nodded and handed me the package that was delivered earlier today.
I flipped open the flap pulled the papers, scanning them they were exactly as I ordered. Service completed, contract fulfilled, honorably discharged. I pushed them back into the envelope; I will share them with my Babe tonight.
"Anything else I need to know?" I asked them before I left the room. Lester nodded his head not looking too happy. I looked at him thinking what now.
"We were talking after the client meeting and she was bringing up a lot of shit with her family, the burg, etc. Well in all of that and trying to get her to see that she has a place among us, I told her." He said pausing I looked at him but I could see he really wasn't sure how to continue this conversation.
"You told her what?" I asked him wondering what the fuck did he open is big mouth and tell now.
"I told her that there have been two people here in Trenton from the hit that was placed on her but that both had been neutralized by the help of Hector's influence." He said and I looked at him.
I hadn't wanted her to know about that. I didn't want her to know that there were actually two hit men that had come here looking to kill her. I didn't want her to know how close the danger had actually gotten to her.
I was grateful for Hector and his street influences and what they were willing to do to stay on Hector's good side. I would never forget that and I would find a way to pay the gang back in some way. I appreciated them protecting my Babe.
I knew it was done for Hector more than my Babe, they didn't know her. She didn't mean shit to them but because she meant something to Hector she now meant something to them. They would protect her to keep from having Hector after them. They weren't stupid they knew what would happen if they ended up on the bad side of Hector. It was becoming quite clear you messed with Stephanie, or hurt Stephanie and you would find yourself on the bad side of a lot of deadly men in Trenton not just Hector.
She was stealing all of our hearts and I was happy that the men I trusted the most were welcoming her into Rangeman. She was here whether they wanted her or not but it made everyone lives easier that they wanted her to be here as much as I did. The fact that they accepted her was willing to protect her and that they wanted her to be a part of their lives made me even more proud to serve with them.
These were my brothers, my family and it would have been tough had they not accepted Stephanie. However, I would have chosen her over all of them had there been a choice. I wouldn't have wanted to but I can breathe without them, it doesn't feel like I can without her.
"How did she take it?" I asked him. He sighed which I was taking as not too good.
"Well at first she got upset. She almost lost it to the point of causing herself to hyperventilate. But she got over it and let me talk to her a little more. I think when it was all over said and done with she was okay although she may want to talk to you a little more about it. I think in the end she was more worried about what would happen to us and the gang bangers if they were caught." He said and I shook my head. Leave it up to her to be worried about everyone else except herself.
"So how was she when she got back here?" I asked him.
"She seemed okay." He said shrugging his shoulders. I shook my head.
"What, you ask me like I am a fucking expert on women's emotions. She wasn't crying, she wasn't upset she seemed like she was normal. I don't know what else to fucking say." He said defending his comment about her being okay.
I nodded my head one time. "Anything else?" I asked. Bobby spoke up, fuck was it going to end.
"I need to see her in the clinic but it can wait until tomorrow. She may have over done it on the treadmill this morning. I noticed what looked like a wince when she stepped down off of it. It may have been nothing but her stepping down, as Lester said he didn't notice her favoring her leg today. I haven't pushed the issue I figured I would catch up with her tomorrow or if she was hurting bad enough she would find me." He said and I nodded and he continued.
"I think she was sort of avoiding me since the two of you went against my orders. She was feeling too guilty to look me in the eye." He said and I cut my eyes to him.
"You say anything to her?" I asked him and he shook his head, no. Good or I would have another appointment for mat time tomorrow. I nodded.
"If that is all, I am heading upstairs." I stated they all nodded their heads. I gave a nod and walked out of the office. I had missed her in the short time I had been gone. It was an emotion that I wasn't really familiar with but it felt good in a way.
I ran up the stairs entered the apartment but all was quite. I looked into the living room as I walked by but she wasn't in there. I continued on down the hall way I could see she wasn't in the kitchen. I paused at the bedroom door.
Looking in she was lying across the bed, sleep. She had her body wrapped in a towel, and a towel on her pillow under her wet hair. My dick went hard at the thought of her being naked under the towel. It was all I could do to walk past her to the bathroom. I quickly undressed, hopped into the shower. I was hoping I could quickly shower and not wake her. I wanted to have a chance to join her on the bed.
I quickly washed my body, dried myself off and wrapped a towel around my waist. I stepped back into the bedroom and she was still lying there asleep. I walked over to the bed and lowered myself down beside her careful not to wake her. I put my arms around her and pulled her closer to me so her body was touching mine. I was home. I felt like I had come home for the first time in my life.
I had been on missions, countless missions, and been glad to come home. Been thankful to make it home back to Rangeman but none of those times no matter how thankful I was to make it back alive did it feel like this. This felt like it was so much more. Having her body pressed against mine us lying in our bed being able to touch her in ways that I craved for the past two days. The feeling was foreign to me, but it was better than any I had ever felt. I buried my nose in her hair pulling in a deep breath through my noise, smelling her scent.
She started to arouse waking up in my arms and I found myself caught between wanting her to be awake so I could make love to her, and remaining sleep so I could just hold her and selfishly take all of her in.
Her eyes opened up and settled on me and I smiled her lips curling up in a smile as she pushed the sleep from her eyes. She stretched slightly realizing she was still wrapped in a towel she went to pull herself up off the bed but I just held on tighter not quite ready to have her out of my arms.
"Hi."
"Hi." I said back to her smiling.
"When did you get in?" She asked me taking in the fact that my chest was bare and I had a towel wrapped around my waist.
"Just a little bit ago; I took a shower then laid down beside you so I could hold you while you slept." I told her as I lowered my lips to her placing a kiss on her soft lips. The feel of her lips had my eyes rolling in the back of my head, my dick hardening to the point that it was threatening the towel's fold to remain on my waist.
I bit back the urge to moan at how wonderful it all felt. Her weight in my arms, the feel of her skin against mine and the feel of her lips all felt like little pieces of heaven that had been bestowed to me. I don't know what I did to deserve them, but I knew I would never take them for granted, I would never abuse them, and I would forever protect them.
Our lips parted and she pulled her head back from me. I wasn't thrilled but I raised my head up looking down at her. "Everything go okay?" She asked me her eyes watching mine. I nodded.
"Yeah all went okay. He agreed, like I told you but just so you can see for yourself." I said as I reached over and grabbed the envelope from the nightstand and handed it to her. She sat up holding her towel so it wouldn't open and started opening the envelope.
I watched as her eyes scan the paper work. Taking in the document she would look at me and then look back to the document.
"So you are free. How does it feel?" She asked me and I smiled at her. There was a point in my life when I would have never wanted this.
"It feels good, laying here besides you right now it feels really good." I tell her and she smiles but then the smile drops and she looks at me.
"Carlos, I know this is a big step for you, are you sorry you did this?" She motions to the papers in her hand. I shake my head no.
"Babe, there was a point in my life that I never imagined doing anything else other than running missions and Rangeman. There was always something about the missions that drove me. The danger, the challenge, the adrenaline it caused I won't lie to you it is addictive. However, a few weeks ago something came crashing into my life that changed all of that. That little crash, well maybe not so little, gave me something that is so much greater, more fulfilling and more consuming than any mission ever could be. Having you in my life has made me want things I never thought I would ever want." I explained to her.
She put her arms around me as mine circled her and she held me to her as I tightened my hold on her.
"Carlos, I feel the same way. I want things with you that I have never wanted. Things I swore I would never want." She said with a shaky voice. I knew she was fighting back tears and I was only hoping they were happy tears.
I pulled back cupping her face in my hands holding her close to my face so I could stare into her beautiful shiny bright eyes. She needed to see me for what I was about to tell her. She needed to know how real this was for me. How much I meant this, and how much I wanted this.
"Babe, I need to tell you how much I love you. How much I want you in my life; need you in my life. I would give up any contract, anything necessary to have you stand beside me; with me. Know that nothing in my life will ever be more important than you. There may be things I can't tell you, such as the missions I have gone on, but know that you are the last person I want to keep things from. You are the person that I want to open my heart to, bare my soul to. You are the one person I want to tell my secrets, my dreams, even my nightmares to." I told her as I watched the tears start to run down her cheeks.
I quickly used my thumbs to wipe them off. "Please don't cry, I hate to see you cry." I confessed.
"Carlos these are happy tears. I can't help it I am overwhelmed and they just sort of came out. I love you. I think I have loved you from the moment I woke up in the hospital room. I want to be the person you share your life with, but I want to share my life with you. I want you to know my secrets, my dreams, and my nightmares too. I want you to know that I didn't know love, that I didn't know what it meant to have a soul mate until I found you." She said as my arms tightened around her pulling her to me. I needed these towels between us to be gone. I needed to feel her skin against my skin.
I pulled her further towards me as I lay back down. She followed but after my kiss she pulled away propping herself up on my chest looking me in the eye. She wasn't done talking.
"Carlos, Lester told me some things today that I want to ask you about." I wasn't sure at that point if I should allow Lester to live or not. I could hear a quiver of uncertainty in her voice.
"You can ask me anything, Babe. I will do my best to answer it as honestly and truthful as I can, depending on what it is about." I told her.
"Well he said several things actually. He told me that the guys here have accepted me." She said and I nodded. That seemed to be a given to me. They all seemed to love her. "He also told me that I have Hector's protection. That Hector has a following on the street that he has influence over that he has used to keep me safe." I once again nodded finding her choice of words odd to describe the gang on the street. Most people would have judged in a way that they were either afraid or disgusted of the gang members.
"Yeah Babe, he has influence when it comes to the streets." I told her using her same words. It was better than saying they listened to him because they feared for their lives.
"He told me that someone, he didn't know who or how many, have killed two men because of me." She said and I could see her mind working through what he had told her as she was telling me. I had my arms around her I pulled my right hand off of her back and pushed an unruly curl behind her ear before I answered her.
Smiling at her I began. "Yes, Babe, someone from the streets did. I don't know who it was either. I only know that two hit men had been asking about you at two separate times. They were trying to get some information on you they were taken care of and that they will never pose another threat to you." I told her.
"When did that happen? When did you find out?" She asked me.
"I found out just a few days ago. The night before I left to go have a chat with my handler. It was one of the driving factors for talking with him to get him to remove the hit he had on you." I told her pulling her up my body more so I could kiss her lips again.
She returned the kiss but pulled back again. "Carlos, what happens if they get caught? What happens if it gets back to Rangeman or to Hector or god forbid you?" She asked and I could hear a slight edge of panic in her voice.
"Babe, don't get upset. The gang is more than knowledgeable of how to take someone out. If they ever found a body there would be nothing to identify him with but fake name, fake history. It will be a gang related death nothing linking it back to Rangeman, Hector, or myself. Nothing to date has been discovered and I doubt that it ever will. Trenton police don't really focus on gang deaths, they would rather not know about them." I told her.
"Carlos, they killed for me. How am I supposed to feel about that? I don't know how to feel about it. I mean people I don't know, never met killed someone because they were a threat to me. Not one time but twice." She said once again I saw tears in her eyes and I knew these weren't the happy tears she had moments ago. I wasn't sure what to tell her but I was relieved that she had the protection. That they had protected her, I knew it wasn't because of her. It was because of having to answer to Hector if they didn't but in the end it was to my Babe's benefit and that was all that mattered.
"I can't tell you how to feel. I can only tell you how I feel and hope that on some level you will feel the same or at least understand. I realize the value of someone else's life is different for me than it is for you. But I am not a monster that enjoys the killing of innocent lives." I confessed to her not sure if that was entirely the whole truth as much as it was the truth I wanted for myself.
"I am glad that you are protected. I don't care if it is a gang member on the street, every one of the men in this building, or me. I forever will want you protected. I never want to see you harmed, hurt, or God forbid taken from me and if it takes everyone of us to make sure that doesn't happen then I will never be sorry and I will be able to live with whatever that means. What I have come to find out about myself is the one thing I can't live without and that is you. I can't lose you now that I have you." I confessed to her. I had opened myself up to her to the point that it felt like I was bleeding. But she had to know how I felt; she had to know what she meant to me.
She lowered her head down on my chest and I felt moisture hit my chest. I cupped her face pushing her hair back and held her to me. I knew she was too overwhelmed with the weight of my confession to speak at the moment so I just held her. I knew she was filtering in my words to her and I hoped that she would respond by saying she couldn't live without me.
After a few minutes she picked her head up and looked at me. Her eyes still swimming with tears. "Carlos, I don't know how I feel about that. I do know that I would be willing to give everything I had to protect you. I don't want to think about someone giving their life for mine, or taking another life to protect mine but I know I would want them to do it to protect yours. Like you, I have come to learn that I can't live without you. Hell last night was hard enough not having you in bed beside me. I missed you. I worried about you. I wanted you here. I know it sounds like I am needy, and I will try to never be that way, but I really wanted you home and in bed with me when it came time to go to sleep." She said and I pulled her further up my body and claimed her lips. Turning her so she was lying back on the bed and I was hovering above her I kissed her for everything I felt.
I wasn't going to break my connection with her to tell her I wanted her with me last night. Instead I decided to show her how much I wanted her as I pulled at the towel where it was tucked to pull it from around her body exposing her beautiful body to me.
Her arms wrapped around me as her hands started rubbing up and down my back then settling around my neck. The sensation of her moving her hands up and down caused wave after wave of desire to build up within me. No one had ever affected me the way she does with a single touch my skin feels electrified as a pulse runs throughout my body bringing it to life.
As I use one hand to hold my body up off of hers I run the other one down along her side. Feeling her body the fullness of her breast as my hand moves down her side, to how her stomach curves in from the size of her rib cage and then back out with the curves of her hips. I notice how I am feeling skin with muscle and flesh and not just bones and I can't help the joy that surges through me as I deepen the kiss the need for her growing more with every passing second.
It takes everything within me to hold myself back from surging between her legs filing her with my throbbing hard dick. I wanted this to be about the love I felt for her, how I cherished her and not about my urgent incessant need for her. That would never stop, that would never lessen and there would be plenty of time to show her how much I wanted her but right now was the time to show her she was cherished, worshipped, and loved more than I ever knew I was capable of.
I pulled away from her just enough to look at her beautiful face, placing both of my hands on either sides of her face while I held my body up off of her using my elbows and forearms. My eyes locking on hers as I moved my body closer to hers I position myself between her legs feeling her hot moist center had my dick responding on its own by jumping in anticipation of the feeling of her wrapped tightly around it.
"I love you." I tell her as she smiles at me cupping my face with her hands.
"I love you too." She says as I slowly push myself inside her she pulls me down to her to claim my lips which I quickly respond by deepening the kiss as I once again have the overwhelming feeling that I had just come home.
Let me know what you think…Leave a review…one more chapter and the story will be complete!